School district consolidation: Market concentration and the scale-efficiency tradeoff

摘要: Consolidation is often proposed as a strategy for increasing school district quality without educational funding. However, if consolidation reduces competition in the local market and efficiency, any savings from exploiting economies of scale may be lost to increased inefficiency. We use stochastic cost function investigate these effects districts Texas. find important scale, but we also that concentration leads Finally, illustrate practical importance two potentially offsetting factors simulation considers consolidating Texas county-level districts. failure consider effect on can lead large overestimates benefits consolidation.